


world turned upside down

by polkadot



Category: Tennis RPF
Genre: Bisexuality, Friends to Lovers, Multi, Oblivious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-18
Updated: 2013-06-18
Packaged: 2017-12-15 09:08:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/847771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polkadot/pseuds/polkadot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thirteen years after a starry night in Sydney, Tommy watches two kids in love and has a startling realisation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	world turned upside down

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [倾城之恋[world turned upside down]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4275435) by [Heline_Zhang](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heline_Zhang/pseuds/Heline_Zhang)



> Disclaimer: Not real, all fake.

_2000_

It’s kind of blowing Tommy’s mind a little bit to look up at the sky and realise that they’re at the bottom of the world. The sky should look different, he thinks. The stars should be, you know, upside down or something. Or like, funny shaped. He thinks of home, of all the people walking around upside down, and goes vaguely cross-eyed.

“You are _so_ drunk,” the boy next to him says, laughing.

Tommy shakes his head, rolling his head from side to side on the Sydney grass, but quickly stops. Shaking his head makes the stars spin, and even his cast-iron 22-year-old stomach isn’t doing so well right now. “Am not.”

“Are too,” the kid says, comfortably. “Told you not to have that last beer.”

“Well, aren’t you the goody little two-shoes, Rog,” Tommy tells him, squinting up at the stars. Some of them are probably airplanes. He’s going to have to get back in an airplane soon. He doesn’t like airplanes.

“Am not,” Roger says. “I snuck out with you to celebrate, didn’t I?”

Tommy scowls. He’s trying not to remember that. It’s not that a silver medal is _bad_ , it isn’t, it’s awesome, it’s all kinds of awesome, but getting to the gold medal match and not winning kiiiiind of sucks balls. Especially after he was down a set _twice_ and fought back to level the score both times, only to _still lose_.

“I hate the Russian national anthem,” he informs Roger, not sure why he feels the need to, except that it seems like Roger should know. “Also people named Yevgeny.”

Roger’s laughing at him. Tommy can feel Roger’s shoulder shaking against his as they lay on the Australian grass together under an upside-down sky. “At least you have a medal. This horrible German guy came along and beat me in the semis and knocked me into the bronze medal match, and then I didn’t even win _that_.”

“I hear the horrible German guy’s fucking hot,” Tommy says, contentedly.

He gets poked in the side for that. “I’m just saying, if you think silver sucks, getting fourth sucks more. At least with a medal you can walk around wearing it and get pretty much any girl you want.”

It’s true, Tommy’s seen a lot of girls making eyes at him since they hung the thing around his neck. Not that Tommy doesn’t get a lot of girls making eyes at him normally, because he’s fucking hot and everyone wants a piece of his action. But this is even more than usual. He could be the fucking gold medallist of fucking if he wanted to.

That doesn’t quite explain why he’s out here under the stars with a scrawny 19-year-old Swiss kid, but then, Roger’s got this weird charm thing going on that Tommy doesn’t quite understand. You kind of want to be around him all the time, and he makes you laugh, and then you kind of feel a bit funny, but that’s probably the beer talking. Or maybe those Serbians – or was it Slovenians? – or Somalians? – too many S countries in the alphabet – anyway, maybe they spiked the punch. There’s no reason Tommy should be feeling this dizzy when Roger rolls over and bumps into him. It’s barely a jolt, but his head feels all strange.

“You wanna wear it?” he asks, making a vague gesture in the direction of his chest, where he’s pretty sure the medal’s still hanging, unless one of those Swedes or South Africans made off with it.

Roger props himself up on one elbow, peering down at him. His eyes glitter a little bit, like the stars. Yes, Tommy’s officially tipsy now. “That’s okay, silver’s not really my colour. I’m holding out for gold next time.”

“I’ll beat you then too,” Tommy says immediately, grinning, because trash-talk is something they do - well, it’s something he does. What Roger usually does is laugh.

“Just you try,” Roger says, smiling down at him. “You can have the silver again if you want, though. A matched pair.”

Tommy would flip him off, but he’s not sure he’d judge the distance correctly. He might poke Roger in the eye instead. “Generous.”

“I’m always generous,” Roger says, looking down at him. 

Roger’s face is open, free, shining. Tommy watches the different flecks of colour in his eyes in mute fascination, watches as they shift and change. Behind Roger’s head the stars are tilting in the sky, upside-down and beautiful. 

Tommy blinks.

Then a massive yawn suddenly overtakes him, and the strange tipsy moment is broken. “Dude,” he says, still yawning, “do you think any of those lovely people from Sierra Leone might have a bed I could borrow?”

Roger sighs. “They were Slovakians, I think,” he says, “and I’m pretty sure one of the girls spiked the punch. You can crash at mine.”

“Too far away,” Tommy says woefully, but he lets Roger take his hand and pull him up, and leans into Roger’s side. Roger’s warm and the side of his neck is soft against Tommy’s nose, and then Tommy breathes in some of Roger’s hair and starts coughing and sneezing at the same time. Roger’s laughing helplessly, and Tommy thinks maybe silver wasn’t that bad after all.

Next time he’s totally getting the gold, though.

~//~

_2013_

Normally, Tommy wouldn’t have even noticed the pair practicing on the court next to his. Not only is he usually busy with his own practice, but when he’s working, he tends to tune everything else out. 

(How to focus during practice is a skill Tommy learned early on, when any attempt to moderate the humid sun by taking his shirt off resulted in sighs and shrieks from onlookers. Most guys stop having to deal with that eventually – most 30-somethings don’t have a shriek-worthy torso or swoon-worthy good looks - but then Tommy thinks sanguinely that he is anything but most guys. _His_ fans still swoon over him just as much at 35 as they did when he was 22.)

Anyway, Tommy would usually be in the zone, focusing on his game and ignoring other courts entirely. But today his hitting partner needed a bathroom break, so Tommy’s ended up leaning against the fence for a few minutes, absentmindedly watching the pair next door. 

There’s nothing out of the ordinary about them - it’s just Stan and that tall skinny French kid who’s tagging around with him these days. They seem to be practicing half in earnest and half in fun; one minute the French kid will be obediently helping Stan run a backhand drill, and the next he’ll suddenly dink a cheeky little drop shot over the net, laughing as Stan swears and tries to dash in to get it.

Tommy remembers those days, when tennis was a game as well as a job. He hopes he hasn’t entirely lost them. Valentina keeps him young, of course, and every year now seems like an extra blessing from the tennis gods. Still, he wonders if he ever shone on a court the way the French kid does - full of youthful bravado, bubbling with laughter, calling cheerful abuse over the net and hitting ridiculous shots into the corners, every move betraying his joy.

Perhaps a bit too much bravado, though. As Tommy watches them, the kid throws himself into the air, launching himself in a full-out flying leap, racquet vainly outstretched as a winner from Stan zings by just out of reach. After the leap comes the fall, and the kid tumbles to the ground spectacularly, hitting and rolling, then lies still, face pressed against the clay.

When he doesn’t get up immediately, Tommy frowns in worry. The spectre of injury always haunts the alleys of the tennis court, but injuries sustained during practice sting just that little bit more. He’d hate for one morning of overexuberance, one rash moment of hotdogging, to jeopardise a young career. “You okay, kid?” he calls.

The kid doesn’t answer, but Stan half-turns and waves in acknowledgement before trotting across his side of the court and rounding the net. Setting his racquet on the bench, he jogs over to check on his hitting partner; he says something in French, incomprehensible to Tommy, his voice rising in a question. The kid still hasn’t moved.

The kid doesn’t respond to Stan’s question either. Tommy finds himself biting his lip as Stan, looking increasingly worried, bends down and reaches his hand out to touch the kid’s shoulder –

That’s when the kid rolls over and grabs Stan’s hand, lightning-quick, pulling Stan down on top of him. 

Tommy smiles, relieved, as the two play-tussle in the clay like giant children. Their clothes will be irretrievably wrecked, but he suspects they don’t mind; Stan’s laughing, half in exasperation but half in fun, and the kid’s trying to pin Stan’s shoulders to the ground. They look a bit like two puppies in a heap, inextricably tangled, all arms and legs and delight.

When Stan finally extricates himself, he quickly retreats out of range of the kid - just in time, as the kid’s reaching out to grab his ankle and pull him down again. Tommy chuckles. This kid just doesn’t give up. Already he’s hopping to his feet, tongue between his teeth, stalking after Stan with intent in his eyes.

Stan looks around for help and snatches his racquet off the bench, holding it in front of him like a sword. He’s smiling too, saying something under his breath that Tommy can’t hear.

The kid grins at him and steps in close, unafraid, his hand shooting out lightning-quick. But his hand doesn’t land on the racquet, as Tommy’s would have done, it doesn’t try to tug the racquet free from Stan’s grasp. His hand lands on Stan’s wrist instead.

It could be an accident, Tommy thinks, even as he watches the kid’s long fingers curl around Stan’s wrist for the briefest of moments. He watches Stan’s head go back, just the littlest bit, Stan’s body sway forwards, just for a second. He watches the kid smile, full of that same boundless joy that Tommy’d seen in his game a few minutes ago, smile down into Stan’s face, his eyes shining. 

So.

The whole thing lasts only a few seconds, and then the kid releases Stan’s wrist. He steps back, picks up his own dropped racquet, retreats to his side of the net. He pulls a ball from his pocket and starts cheerfully berating Stan for being too slow to get back to the baseline. 

Tommy’s mind is all awhirl.

He’d keep watching, but just then his own hitting partner comes back from his bathroom break (having been delayed by a typically garrulous Tipsarevic), and it’s back to work for Tommy.

He reaches up into his serve, and tries to focus.

The kid on the next court is laughing again.

~//~

“That’s Benoît,” Roger says, when Tommy asks him.

The name sounds slightly odd in his mouth, but Tommy might just be imagining things. 

“Benoît?” he repeats, memorizing the name. “So he’s the new you, huh?”

Roger’s doing that slightly huffy thing he does sometimes where he acts like he didn’t hear you and he’s oh-so-busy in his locker. It intimidates some of the younger players, who are still getting used to being in close proximity to the GoAT. It doesn’t intimidate Tommy. 

He pokes Roger in the side, just where he’s ticklish. “Don’t get all high-and-mighty on me, Your Worshipfulness. I know there’ll never be another you, you’re the greatest, yada yada yada. I meant, what’s up with this Benoît and Stan?”

“Nothing’s _up_ ,” Roger says stiffly, stepping sideways before Tommy can poke him again. “They play doubles together sometimes.”

Tommy gives his back an unimpressed look. “Uh-huh. Tell that to somebody who buys your crap, genius. C’mon. What’s up?”

Poor Dan, passing by, gives Tommy the widest-eyed look he’s ever seen. Tommy just grins at him. You speak German, you’re gonna hear Tommy needling the Fed sometimes. It happens. Get used to it, kid. And hey, count your blessings - some of the things the Spanish guys say to Rafa are so, so much worse. 

Roger’s apparently given up on the whole rummaging-through-his-locker charade. He sinks down on the bench in front of it. “I don’t know.”

Tommy nudges him over on the bench a little bit to make room for his own ass. “Sure you don’t. You’re only Stan’s best friend and sometimes his doubles partner.” He eyes Roger’s face. “Or at least you _were_ until he dropped you like a hot potato and took up with this Benoît dude. _Sure_ you don’t know anything about it.”

“You,” Roger says, “are a pain in the ass.”

Luckily Brands is long gone, or he might have fainted. But Tommy’s used to Roger’s less-gracious side coming out around him - it’s one of Tommy’s many talents, getting Rog to loosen up a little. “Yeah, but you like me anyways. And don’t think you’re going to make me forget about Stan. I can keep asking forever.”

When Roger fiddles with the bottom of his shirt, Tommy knows he’s getting closer. “It’s not my business.”

The tone of his voice catches Tommy by surprise. He’d thought Roger giving him the run-around was just Roger being delicate and circumspect, the way he usually is – it always takes Tommy a while to wear him down and get him to share gossip. (Not that Roger generally knows much. He can be a bit oblivious. Preoccupied, focused, whatever you wanna call it.) 

If Tommy’s reading Roger’s tone right, though, this isn’t just about his prudence or selective vision. This is something else. Tommy should probably leave it alone. 

Then again, when has Tommy ever been known for leaving it alone?

“So if I was to say that I’m like 100% sure that those two are dating…” he says, letting the sentence trail off.

“Not our business,” Roger repeats, putting the stress on the “our” this time.

Tommy would poke him again, because hey, the two of them have been prying into other people’s business since like 2000 or 1999 or something, so like _last century_ (although to be entirely honest that’s probably mostly Tommy, but still). Anyway, Tommy _would_ poke him, but this time Roger’s anticipated him and stood up, moving away.

He doesn’t pretend to look through his locker this time. He just leans against it, staring into the middle distance.

“You got a problem with two crazy kids in love?” Tommy asks, bluntly.

Roger looks at him like he’s a dumbass. (Hey, at least he’s looking at him. Tommy can deal with the dumbass bit. Sara thought he was a dumbass for like, years, but she also thought he was a pretty dumbass, so.) “No, of course not.”

“Then what?” Tommy prods. “You can’t be mad at this kid for stealing Stan as a doubles partner. You’re too All Great and Powerful to actually play normal doubles these days. And if you want him for Davis Cup you can still have him – kid’s French, not Swiss.”

“It’s not…” Roger says, then cuts himself off, looking away again. “Forget it. It’s none of our business, but if it’ll make you happy, I’m glad for them.”

Tommy hasn’t been mates with the guy for half his life without learning when to drop things. 

He gets up and leans on the locker next to Roger’s, letting the silence ripen companionably for a minute or two before changing the subject with, “So, I should tell you something.”

Roger looks appropriately wary. “What?”

Tommy grins. “Valentina _may_ have taught the girls a new word. Sorry about that. I bumped my toe on the door last week, and she likes the way the ‘f’ and the ‘k’ sound.”

Roger glares at him, and the world returns to its normal track.

~//~

Tommy’s never claimed to be the smartest of men. So it’s a day or so before he suddenly sits bolt upright at the breakfast table and says, “Roger almost kissed me.”

“Tommy,” Sara says, gently, “you’ve just slopped oatmeal all over your shirt.”

Tommy looks down. Sure enough, he has. Valentina’s beaming at him and clapping her hands as if he’s just performed a circus trick, though, so at least he’s scored with one of the females in his family. “That’s all you have to say, ‘Tommy you’ve made a mess’?”

“Take your shirt off and put it in the laundry before it stains?” Sara offers.

Tommy sighs, strips his shirt off with one practiced movement, and chucks it across the kitchen and into the laundry hamper.

“Good shot, dear,” Sara says. “Now what’s this about Roger?”

“He nearly kissed me!” Tommy repeats, still overcome by this realisation.

Sara raises an eyebrow. She does seem to be giving him her full attention now, which would be gratifying if Tommy didn’t have the sneaking suspicion that at least part of it is due to the fact that he’s shirtless. (On the other hand, Sara getting distracted by shirtlessness can be a very good thing, even if they’ll have to postpone sex until Valentina’s down for a nap.)

“He kissed you?” Sara repeats. “Huh. You’d think he’d ask Mirka first, and she’d definitely have told me…”

“He didn’t _actually_ kiss me,” Tommy says. “Just, almost. And it was before Mirka.” Probably right before, thinking back. Tommy can’t remember if she was at that party with the spiked punch or not, but it couldn’t have been too much longer before those two got together.

Sara looks confused. “Before Mirka? So like, eighty million years ago?”

“Thirteen,” Tommy says. 

“And you only just now remembered this why?”

 _Because of the look in Roger’s eyes when I asked him if he had a problem with crazy kids in love._ “I don’t know. I was pretty drunk at the time. I guess I just forgot.”

Sara leans back in her chair, crossing her arms. “So, you and Roger - at what, 22 and 19? - almost hooked up when you were drunk.”

“Kissed, I said kissed,” Tommy says – although she’s probably right, he was a pretty horny guy back then, and Roger was hot in his gawky bad-haircut kind of way, and if things had got started, who knows where they might have ended up? 

Sara looks thoughtful. Then she grins. “Well, thanks for telling me.”

“You’re not mad?”

“Why would I be mad?” Sara says, and then takes the fork away from Valentina. “That’s not a brush, _Liebling_ , it doesn’t go in our hair.”

Tommy blinks. “Why would you be mad? I nearly kissed a dude? I nearly kissed Roger!”

What would’ve it been like if Roger _had_ leaned down those few inches and kissed him? What would Roger’s lips have felt like? What would Roger’s skin have been like under his fingers? What would Roger have sounded like if Tommy had pressed a kiss under his jaw?

“Tommy,” Sara says, grinning in the way that usually means he’s about to get very lucky, “let me rephrase this. Years before you got together with me, you almost had a summer fling with a very hot guy. Why would I be mad about that? Now I just have an extra fantasy.”

Tommy opens his mouth to join in with her amusement, to laugh it off, to accept that he’s inexplicably turned his wife on instead of facing the firing squad, but somehow he can’t.

What would it be like now?

“Besides,” Sara adds, watching him, “I kind of already thought you _had_ hooked up with him. Do you know how you guys act together?”

“We’re friends,” Tommy says, through lips that feel faintly numb.

“Friends, yeeeeees,” Sara says, drawing the word out. “But, c’mon, surely friends with a history. The way he looks at you…”

Tommy doesn’t know how Roger looks at him. He suddenly wants to know. “How…”

He can’t finish the sentence. He remembers how Roger looked at him that night, the upside-down stars of Australia like a halo around his head. He can almost feel the bumpy grass under his back, Roger’s breath ghosting across his mouth. 

“Tommy,” Sara says, and in the midst of his tilting world Tommy’s grateful that she looks sympathetic, not angry – well, she looks sympathetic with a hearty dash of amused, but he’ll take it – “should we maybe talk about this?”

~//~

“Hi,” Tommy says to Rafa, watching the back of a certain other person almost imperceptibly stiffen. “Sorry, I’m just going to borrow him for a second.”

Rafa grins at him. “Hi, Tommy. You bring him back in one piece?”

“No promises,” Tommy says, before grabbing hold of Roger’s arm and dragging him bodily off in the direction of the ice-bath room.

The advantages of the ice-bath room are that it’s deserted this early in the morning and it has a door that shuts. The disadvantage is that it’s fucking cold. Still, Tommy’s hoping that the coldness won’t be a problem for long.

Roger looks mostly confused when Tommy gets them in there. “Tommy, what’s going on?”

“You don’t know?” 

Roger crosses his arms over his chest. “I know you interrupted my conversation with Rafa and brought me in here to freeze.”

Tommy grins at him, because Roger’s kind of adorable when he’s cross (and holy hell, Tommy’s only now just getting used to those kinds of thoughts popping up. His brain has apparently decided to give him thirteen years of suppressed observations all at once.) 

He also grins because if he doesn’t grin he’s going to get cold feet, and because they’re Roger and Tommy, and because grins are just part of the equation. “Good. Mirka said she wouldn’t tell you. Good for her.”

Now Roger does look spooked. “Mirka said she wouldn’t tell me what?”

“That I was going to do this,” Tommy says, and pushes off from the wall.

He hasn’t given himself enough time to get nervous, and anyway Tommy Haas doesn’t get nervous - he laughs in the face of nerves - except he really doesn’t - not now - oh the look in Roger’s eyes -

He closes the last breath of distance.

Roger’s lips are as warm as he’d ever imagined they’d be. 

And then, okay, Tommy hadn’t _expected_ Roger to explode into action and shove him against the door, kissing him hard and fast, but he’s not _opposed_ to the idea. 

He pushes Roger away eventually, just so he can catch his breath, and pants into the space between them, “You don’t have to take the whole thirteen years at once.”

Roger’s eyes widen, and look at that, they’re still just as impossibly deep as they were under those Sydney stars. “You remember that? You were drunk!”

Tommy takes advantage of Roger’s temporary distraction to reverse their positions. He never knew he wanted to have Roger pinned against the door of an ice-bath room, but apparently he did. He’s learning all sorts of things about himself these days. It’s an education.

He leans in close to Roger’s ear, pitching his voice lower. “I _was_ drunk. I’m not now.”

There’s some more kissing, highly satisfactory, and Tommy’s beginning to think that an ice-bath might just be needed after all, if they’re to go back out to the locker room in anything approaching reasonably neat clothes, when Roger pulls back. 

His hair’s a mess, his lips are flushed, and there’s a look in his eyes that makes Tommy want to let out some rather embarrassing noises. Tommy thinks he’s never seen anyone look quite so delicious and so indignant at the same time. “You _remembered_ , all that time, and you didn’t _do_ anything?”

“I didn’t remember until now, genius. Besides, _you_ weren’t drunk,” Tommy says, raising his eyebrows. “You couldn’t try to kiss me when I was sober?”

Roger has the grace to look slightly sheepish. Only slightly, because he’s Roger, after all. “I was nineteen. I got scared. And well, then there was Mirka.”

And all of Tommy’s conquests over the years. Tommy remembers how he used to be, cheerfully regaling Roger with the details. And then there were all the breaks from tennis, the injuries, while Roger’s career marched uninterruptedly on, moving from strength to strength. They never lost touch, they’ve always been friends, but Tommy can see why Roger held back, unsure of his welcome, unwilling to jeopardise what they already had for an uncertain future.

It took thirteen years, it took a French kid called Benoît and his joyful bravery, it took Roger seeing the happiness of others and letting a small bit of his own longing show, it took Tommy finally putting all the puzzle pieces together – but in the end, it’s all come right.

“You do realise,” Tommy says, mock-solemnly, watching as Roger’s eyes widen at his serious tone, “that I could have been doing _this_ all these years.”

Roger’s voice sounds a bit strangled, but that’s probably because Tommy’s kissing under his jaw, and Tommy’s very good at that. “It’s a shame.”

“A crying shame,” Tommy agrees, and tugs impatiently at Roger’s shirt. “Looks like we’ll need to make up for lost time as fast as we can.”

Roger’s laughing, breathlessly, and then he puts a hand under Tommy’s chin, drawing him up for another kiss. He tastes perfect.

“Hey,” he says, against Tommy’s mouth, “want to play doubles with me?”

~//~

_epilogue_

It’s not a gold medal, but it’s a pretty fucking big trophy.

“Silver,” Tommy says, mournfully. “I thought you wouldn’t take anything less than gold. Oww!” 

Roger’s pinched him, giggling, and Tommy glares at him as he squirms away. It’s Melbourne, not Sydney, but the grass is still just as bumpy as he remembers, the Australian stars just as topsy-turvy. Tommy thinks he likes Australia.

“ _This_ silver is fine,” Roger tells him, grinning. “So shut up.”

Tommy thinks they probably don’t let most people take the Australian Open trophy home with them, even for an evening, but then it’s not everyone that wins eighteen fucking Grand Slams. And also this is the guy who slept with the French Open trophy in his bed that one time (yeah, he _says_ he had it on his bedside table, but Tommy knows better). Basically, the rules don’t really apply to Roger. If he wants to sleep with the French Open trophy, he can. If he wants to take the Australian Open trophy out in a field and watch the stars, he can. If he wants to start a relationship with his best friend and be ridiculously happy, he can.

Maybe the ridiculously happy bit is Tommy. But he suspects it’s Roger too.

“I still think you should have let me win,” he says now, magnanimously rolling back over so Roger can snuggle up to him again. “You’ve got so many of those things already. Your house has got to be full of them.”

Roger just laughs. “You wouldn’t want me to let you win.”

“No,” Tommy says. “Maybe not.”

It’s been such an incredible tournament - taking out Ferrer in the quarters, Stan in the semis, screaming himself hoarse courtside during the epic Roger-Rafa semi that nearly equaled Wimbledon 2008 for brilliance. Tommy remembers the moment Roger won that match, remembers picking up one of the twins and swinging her up into the air, both of them laughing in pure joy. He remembers gathering Mirka and Sara into one massive hug, kissing Sev on the forehead (to his great bemusement), grinning at every camera pointed their way. 

He remembers lying in bed with Roger that night, fake-planning how to throw their final, knowing all the while that they’d both play their hearts out and do their best to capture the trophy now looming impressively beside them.

It would have been nice to win, maybe. But when Roger did, all Tommy could feel was joy.

“Hey,” Roger says, propping himself up on his elbow and looking down into Tommy’s face, the stars outlining his head, “I think I owe you a kiss.”

Tommy grins and pulls him down, thirteen years late but right on time.


End file.
